Baby Myles

Words cannot express how happy I am to have met baby Myles today! He is the son of one of my very dearest friends, Lindsey. We met playing basketball in 5th grade! Myles, you are so very loved, even at 12 days old!

We love you and promise to be a part of your amazing life!

My Mom's Garden

I spent a short amount of time in my mom's garden this morning, about 20 minutes, but I took a handful of images I wanted to share- I hope when I come home for a few days at the end of June that everything is totally in bloom!

Home!

I made it back to Cheesetown in record time!  Driving time was 8 hours, 40 minutes, and total was 9 hours, twenty minutes.  I love my GPS and its trip tracker :)

We had Gelsosomo's pizza tonight... mmm. :)

Tomorrow I'm doing Lindsey's baby photos- the little guy is only a few days old!!!  I cannot wait!

It's good to be home, but I miss my little family in Maryland already!  Joe and I talked on Skype tonight and I was glad to see him and the puppy in the video :)  He even got to say hello to grandma and grandpa :)

I am pretty excited to go to bed early *and* sleep in :)

photos...

clearing out my iPhone for my trip... wanted to post these!

Lilly and some of our vintage centerpieces

Rhubarb, an apple pie, watermelon twists, and raspberry vinaigrette from the farmer's market- yum!

lunch a few days ago- love our grill!

strawberries, tomatoes, basil and lavender we planted

our birdfeeders- Lilly is in absolute heaven.  We even had two goldfinches today!

Fun day in Frederick - Joe's First Post!

I finally wanted to add to the website, since it is "JOE and MK". Anyways, we had a great day in Frederick today. Well, not exactly Frederick, more like the outskirts. We were able to find a farm where we bought fresh milk and cheese. Milk in a bottle, who knew! Earlier in the day, we spent some time at a local event "Bark in the Park". Gordon was in heaven, and he made many new friends. We also went to a shop where we were able to find fresh rhubarb stalks for a rhubarb pie, something I have been dying for. It was a great day to spend with MK. I will be posting more so stay tuned!

Workin' it Out

When Joe came home from work yesterday he asked me if I wanted to go to PT with him.  I was just finishing up my work for the day so I said sure.  Joe has to do two hours of PT every work day... which means he is in super good shape... I'm not!

I managed to do a little over eight miles on the bike and two 10 minute miles on the treadmill.  I only stayed for an hour because I had to pick some stuff up for dinner, but it was good. 

Of course, 10 minute miles don't make me happy.  When I was marathoning, I was running 6:30 to 7 minute miles.  So uhm... I have some work to do.  Clearly.  I'm hoping if I keep this up to be back to at least 8 minute miles by the end of the month... we'll see.

I'm not sore today (was sure I would be) but my knees are killing me.  I think it's a combination of working out and the weather.  I have horrible knees.  Everyone in my family does.  No more marathons for me... well, because of my knees *and* because I don't enjoy them.  Gave 'em a try (twice!) and it's not for me... I'll leave 'em to Kate! :)

Best Rainy Weekend Ever

I can easily say that this weekend was one of my favorite of 2009.  I got to spend a lot of time with Joe, sleep in, do wedding stuff, eat great food and hang out with one of my besties.  It was awesome.  :)

Kate and I went downtown Frederick and enjoyed the great weather, tons of live music in the streets, dinner in a dive bar, and lots of cute shops.  Our best find of the night- a couture wedding dress maker from NYC who also has a little shop here in Frederick!  Kate and I loooooved her and every single dress she had in there- they are beautifully made, everything is hand-stitched and one of a kind, finished in 2-4 weeks (that is INSANE) and, the very best part- she is AFFORDABLE!!!  

Then we came home and starting going through wedding magazines and we ended up just making fun of 99.9% of everything in all four magazines.  The wedding industry is warped and insane, people.  Our favorite thing to make fun of are those HIDEOUS pointy-but-round-or-square white shoes.  OMG.  Barf.  Oh, and how the models stand in those stupid poofy dresses.  :)

Today it rained and rained and rained.  We were all feeling lazy and tired from the weather, but we headed out to brunch at Firestone for brunch- YUM!  So tasty.  Then we were on a mission to begin our first wedding project...

Kate and I are going to be our own florists.  The average bride in DC spends between $2,500 and $3,000 on FLOWERS.  Uhmmmm, no thanks.  I am pretty sure Kate and I will be spending about $250 on our flowers, including the containers.  

Since we both want the same type of centerpieces, and our weddings are a month apart, we decided to split the cost of the antique jars we wanted to get.  So today we hit up all the antique stores in town and bought every cute antique jar that was under $4- that was our limit.  I thought it would take a couple months of scanning the antique stores in town (we have 20+) but we got all 46 vases today!  Final cost was $127- that's $63.50 a person for all the jars for our centerpieces... which calculates to approx. $1.40 a jar!  They are beautiful.  Some of them we need to clean up, and that will be our next project!  Hooray for fun, eco-friendly, inexpensive and totally awesome centerpieces!

We'll both be buying some flowers wholesale from local vendors and hopefully using some wildflowers, too.  I found a guy in Frederick who would let me pick his wildflowers if I made a donation to his non-profit that promotes earth-friendly products- heck yeah!  Now that's being thrifty! :)

So anyway, a short story made entirely too long- we had a blast today searching through all these stores and finding great jars as vases under $4.  Joe got into it too, even if he doesn't want to admit it  :)  He was such a big help today- love that guy!  :)

Kate- we did good today!  xoxo!

Here are some photos!!!

Check out this antique store!  Joe bought a beautiful chest to hold blankets here

loved these Turkish locks... Kate was figuring out how she could use them

loved these mini terra cotta pots in the holders... 

thinking of how I could use these for the wedding...

colorful pails that could totally show up on June 19th of next year! :)

Lilly on the chest we bought :)

She's so cute!  And I love the detail of the chest.

Some of the jars we bought... had to try 'em out! :)

Loove these jars that are just a little bit blue

You can't really see the very pretty jar, but I like this photo :)

Oh Hai!  Lilly modeling with our awesome finds :)

All 46 jars/vases!

soooooo pretty!